


An Ever-Fixed Mark

by Lady_of_the_Refrigerator



Series: Indelible Ink [2]
Category: The Blacklist (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Magical Tattoos, Sequel, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-30
Updated: 2015-01-09
Packaged: 2018-01-27 14:18:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 17,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1713689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_of_the_Refrigerator/pseuds/Lady_of_the_Refrigerator
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Without a word, he slipped his jacket from his shoulders and wrapped it around her. She hesitated only a moment before sliding her arms into the sleeves, grateful for the length of them as much as the warmth. The jacket did a much better job hiding the words on her forearm than the blanket the EMTs gave her. [Sequel to Indelible Ink]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Back by popular demand. :P

He climbed into the ambulance and lowered himself onto the bench next to her, stiff-limbed and weary. She wondered when he’d last slept.  
  
He’d saved her life at the expense of someone else’s twice now. (That she knew of.) She wanted to call him a monster for what he did, but she remembered the sensation of his hot blood running between her fingers, of metal puncturing skin and muscle and sinew, and she bit her tongue, swallowed the bile rising in her throat. Maybe he wasn’t any better than Kornish, but she wasn’t any better than him.  
  
Without a word, he slipped his jacket from his shoulders and wrapped it around her. She hesitated only a moment before sliding her arms into the sleeves, grateful for the length of them as much as the warmth. The jacket did a much better job hiding the words on her forearm than the blanket the EMTs gave her.  
  
They sat straight-backed and rigid as the ambulance started its bumpy trek out of the woods. For some reason, his presence grounded her; she knew if she allowed herself to unbend at all, she might end up resting her head on his shoulder and that was a line she wasn’t sure she could cross and come back from.  


* * *

  
  
The words of Kornish’s tattoo would haunt her for days, she was sure of it. She had no choice but to see them; if his modus operandi hadn’t involved stripping nude she might have been spared. She saw them now on the backs of her eyelids in negative, like a flashbulb going off, every time she closed her eyes— _No, please don’t!_ The connotation was horrific. She was suddenly grateful that even though she was fated to have a criminal for a soulmate, she ended up with one more likely to save her life than end it.  
  
She shook herself and tried to focus on the conversation happening around her, one that she was _supposed_ to be an active participant in if her mind would just stop wandering. She’d been poked and prodded and given a clean bill of health. Now Ressler and Meera were taking the opportunity to question/debrief her while she was still a captive audience.  
  
“I’ve hunted Reddington for five years and I’ve never seen him like that. I thought he was going to _eat_ Lorca if he didn’t tell us how to contact Kornish. Whatever he plans to use you for, Keen, good luck. It must be pretty goddamn important to him.”  
  
Liz hugged Red’s jacket around herself and nodded, fighting the obsessive need to keep checking that her tattoo was still covered.  


* * *

  
  
He was waiting for her when they released her a half hour later.  
  
He looked cold, but he wouldn’t ask for his jacket back and she certainly wouldn’t offer it until she was far away from anyone who was there the day he spoke the words it covered.  
  
“Do you mind if I catch a ride with you?”  
  
A brief flicker of surprise crossed his face and she almost smiled.  
  
“Lizzy, my car won’t exactly pass for an FBI carpool,” he said, even as he tucked his hand into the crook of her elbow and started walking over to the vehicle in question.  
  
“I’m not asking you to drive me home, Red. I can’t go home. Not now. Tom’s gonna to want an explanation and I can’t handle going from one interrogation to another. I need to just… be.”  
  
“And you want to just be, with me? You’ve come a long way from attempted murder.”  
  
“You’ve come a long way from trying to kill my husband.”  
  
 _You make me feel safe. A side effect of repeatedly saving my life, who would have guessed_? she thought. _That’s what I need right now. Tom isn’t safe anymore._  
  
She wouldn’t tell him any of that.  


* * *

  
  
He held a mug out to her and waited for her to wrap her hands around the heated ceramic before he sat down next to her and did the same with his own.  
  
“Warm milk?” she asked, with an eyebrow raised. He shrugged.  
  
“Old habit from childhood. At this point, I think I get more comfort from the nostalgia of it than anything in the milk itself, but if it works, it works.”  
  
She took a cautious sip, not wishing to add burnt taste buds to her list of aches and pains. What a strange turn her life had taken in the last day or so. She went from being kidnapped, tortured, and nearly dissolved in a vat of chemicals, to sitting in a hotel room next to The Concierge of Crime, sipping warm milk.  
  
Her thoughts ran a mile a minute, her emotions both familiar and foreign. It seemed like she was borrowing someone else’s unease and worry on top of her own lingering fear and the almost overwhelming dread she felt at having to convince Tom she didn’t want to quit her job even though she almost died.  
  
She shot a furtive glance at Red only to find him shooting one back at her. His gaze skittered away from hers and his pinched expression twisted into an attempt at a smile. Next to the brilliant, reassuring smile he’d given her when Kornish’s drugs started to wear off, it was hardly even a grimace.  
  
“I can feel your anxiety from here, Lizzy.”  
  
“I don’t understand what’s wrong with me,” she said. “By rights, I should be exhausted, but I feel like I just drank an entire pot of coffee with a Red Bull chaser and the only time I can relax at all is when—“ He reached out and took her hand; the relief was complete and immediate and she choked back a sob when she met his watery eyes.  
  
“You feel it, too.”  
  
“I do,” he said. “Touch… it helps somehow.”  
  
He set their empty mugs on the coffee table and turned to her, taking both of her hands in his this time.  
  
“You’re alive,” he said, rubbing his thumbs back and forth. “You’ll be fine.” He sounded like he was reminding himself as much as her, but a tiny piece of the knot in her chest loosened with every movement of his thumbs all the same.  
  
“I meant what I said. I can feel your anxiety. When you were taken, I…” His voice broke and he swallowed hard, struggling for words. “I could feel your fear. It took me a while to realize what was happening because the emotions would ebb and flow, but once I did… I was afraid each time they faded that they wouldn’t come back. I don’t know what I would have done if I didn’t find you in time.”  
  
“But you did,” she said, squeezing his hands in hers. His smile came a little easier and some of the tension in his shoulders eased.  
  
He pushed the loose sleeve of his jacket up her arm and traced his fingers along her tattoo.  
  
“I want you to know,” he said, his voice serious, solemn. “I would have done the same even without this.”  
  
She nodded and, before she could talk herself out of it, she leaned up and pressed a kiss to his stubbled cheek; she tucked herself into his side and pulled his arm around her.  
  
His hand found its way inside the jacket and under the hem of her shirt. It was warm and dry against her skin, the touch soothing and intimate; not sexual, but certainly far from appropriate. Logically, she knew she should protest, but every fiber of her being sang at the contact; it felt too pleasant—too _right_ —to shy away from. She worked her fingers between the buttons on his dress shirt to touch his skin in return.  
  
The last wisps of stress evaporated as her thoughts finally began to quiet, soon to be drowned out by the steady beating of his heart under her ear as she drifted off to sleep.  
  
Life was too short for arbitrary boundaries. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She had fallen asleep in Raymond Reddington’s arms—by choice, no less. She chose him over going home to her husband, who was probably worried sick by now. Maybe. Perhaps.

Liz yawned and stretched as well as she could under the pleasant weight of someone else’s limbs. She’d obviously fallen asleep on the couch again, something that was becoming disturbingly close to a habit lately. It wasn’t like Tom to join her when she didn’t make it to bed, but she wasn’t about to complain. She pressed herself into the warmth and tried to drift off to sleep again. A masculine hum of approval rumbled through the chest under her ear and she stiffened.  
  
That most definitely wasn’t Tom.  
  
Her eyes popped open and memories of the last couple days flooded back to the forefront of her mind.  
  
The case against Lorca falling apart.  
  
The kidnapping and the torture.  
  
The rescue.  
  
The warm milk.  
  
She had fallen asleep in Raymond Reddington’s arms—by choice, no less. She chose him over going home to her husband, who was probably worried sick by now. Maybe. Perhaps.  
  
Liz waited for the inevitable embarrassment and awkwardness to settle in her gut, but it never came. She relaxed against Red’s side, glancing up to see him watching her with a look on his face she could only describe as serene.  
  
“Morning, sweetheart.” He leaned in and pressed a peck of a kiss near the corner of her mouth. The spot tingled. “How do you feel?”  
  
“Like I spent the night running through the woods being chased by a monster and then slept on a couch. Other than that…”—she shrugged with the shoulder Kornish hadn’t prodded with long, sharp metal objects—“better.”  
  
He pressed another kiss next to her lips, and lingered this time. She felt his smile against her cheek.    
  
A month ago, if someone asked Liz if she had ever thought about being unfaithful to her husband, she would have laughed in their face. Today, the temptation to turn and kiss Red properly was there, and it was strong.  
  
Another key piece of information from the night before came back to her and she hoped beyond hope that Red couldn’t feel what she was feeling right now. She untangled herself and stood up, perhaps a bit too quickly to brush off as casual.  
  
“You’re welcome to stay for breakfast.” He checked his watch and his cheek twitched. “I know it’s late, but I have a standing order with the kitchen and they always send more food than one person could ever eat.”  
  
“I can’t avoid Tom forever.”  
  
Judging by the look on Red’s face, he disagreed, but he didn’t argue the point. Instead, ever practical, he said, “He’ll be easier to deal with on a full stomach.”  
  
She was about to turn down the offer, but her stomach had other ideas and growled at the mention of food. Loudly. She sighed and nodded when it was obvious he hadn’t missed the sound. Leaving now would only make her stubborn and hungry.  
  
“I wouldn’t worry too much about what he’ll think. You show up looking like you do right now and he’ll believe whatever you tell him.”  
  
She glanced up to check her reflection in the ornate mirror on the wall and winced.  
  
“Gee, thanks a lot.”  
  
She combed her fingers through her tangled hair, tried to make herself at least somewhat presentable. Red came up behind her and placed a hand gently on her back, stilling her movement.  
  
“Lizzy, you’re a beautiful woman, but you’ve been through a traumatic experience and you certainly look the part. I know I’m not much better off.”  
  
She took in his disheveled appearance over her shoulder in the mirror—the rumpled clothes, the day and a half of stubble on his face, the way his shirt collar stuck up on one side. He was a mess, all right, and he didn’t appear to be self-conscious about it. It was endearing as hell. Humanizing.  
  
She didn’t want to go home.  
  
Damn it.  
  
“Use his sympathy to your advantage. Whether it’s really there or he has to fake it, eke out every last drop he can muster. I’m sure he did the same to you when he was recovering.”  
  
Liz frowned. There was more truth to that than she wanted to admit.  
  
Red held her gaze in the mirror until a knock at the door startled them both. He excused himself to answer it and she felt the loss of warmth between her shoulder blades like she’d been doused in ice water. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. This was going to become a problem.  
  
“I hope there’s something you like,” he said, wheeling a room service table over to the couch. He seemed nervous, sort of like her college boyfriend the first time she stayed the night in his tiny apartment and he tried to make her breakfast in bed. (She used to catch the poor kid looking forlornly at her tattoo and his own all the time; she was pretty sure she broke his heart long before she broke up with him. If only he could see her now.)  
  
“I’ll eat almost anything at this point, just please, God, don’t let it be pancakes.”  
  
“I feel like there’s a story behind that worth hearing,” he said, a faint, inquisitive smile on his face, “but don’t worry. This isn’t really a pancake kind of place.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “This is dangerous,” she said, trying her hardest to suppress a shiver as he continued to stroke her arm, this time without the barrier of the bandage between her skin and his.
> 
> “They’ll find out at some point. It’s bound to happen. They already have mine on file, but I have enough tattoos, they can’t tell which is significant. Thankfully, what you said doesn’t draw much attention. Ressler and Cooper, though… When they see yours, they’ll know what to look for.”

Liz was going to kill her husband. She was. It was only a matter of time.  
  
Everything about Tom was beginning to grate on her. What a month ago might have seemed innocent—if a little overbearing—now held an undertone of malice she just couldn’t shake. The way he woke with the sun and, between him and Hudson, made sure she did as well. His constant need to tell her she was an open book and he always knew what she was thinking, while at the same time complaining that she didn’t share enough with him. His goddamn gluten-free pancakes.  
  
When he dared to tell her he had scheduled an ultrasound without consulting her as if they were going to go through with the adoption like nothing had changed, Liz couldn’t let it stand. She accused him of trying to manipulate her. He had no right to tell her they needed to talk and then go behind her back to make decisions before they had the chance to do so. It made it a lot harder to disagree with him and his choices if plans were already in place. It made her feel obligated and going along with something out of obligation just wasn’t the same as agreement.  
  
Tom was none too pleased by the accusation and rather than consider Liz’s worries, he lashed out at her. He told her it was just as well they didn’t adopt because the kid was bound to end up an orphan sooner or later and there was no need to perpetuate that for another generation. She nearly punched him.  
  
She had been on edge ever since.  
  
The debacle at the farmer’s market only made Liz’s state of mind worse, leaving her and the rest of her team bedraggled and worn out and more than a little disheartened despite the technically successful apprehension of The Courier. They were patching up their various bumps and bruises after the chase when—unfortunately for Liz—something caught Ressler’s eye.  
  
“What the hell is that, Keen?”  
  
Liz followed his line of sight and blanched. After she was kidnapped, she started using make-up to hide her tattoo whether or not she wore long sleeves; some of it had smudged off in the sweat and grime, and a few bright red letters were visible along her forearm.  
  
“None of your business, that’s what,” she snapped, quickly wrapping a couple spare lengths of gauze around her tattoo. She would have been OK with literally anyone else in the world save Cooper seeing it, but of course it had to be Ressler.  
  
“Was that your tattoo? We all have them, why bother hiding it?”  
  
“Maybe I want to preserve the last illusion of privacy I have in this scrutinized hell that is my life. Maybe I just want to be left alone for once.”  
  
Ressler blinked in confusion at the venom in Liz’s voice and turned to Meera.  
  
“I don’t get it,” he said, not as quietly as he should have. “Unless it’s me, and I _know_ it’s not me, what’s the big deal? It won’t mean anything to me.”  
  
“If it won’t mean anything to you, back off,” Liz yelled over her shoulder as she stormed away in search of a ride back to the Post Office. She was getting antsy again, in a way that could only be solved by being near Red, and he was sure to show his face soon enough after this disaster of an operation. Her apprehension fueled his and filtered back to her in a weird sort of feedback loop. This soulmate bullshit would be the death of her yet.  


* * *

  
  
Red strode into the Post Office flanked by Dembe, who watched him warily. He was a man on a warpath, anger and annoyance radiating off him in waves. Needless to say, it hit Liz especially hard; she had never been more pleased that his ire wasn’t directed at her.  
  
His gaze, however, was. He eyed the gauze around her forearm, concern clear in his expression, and she gave a short, stiff shake of her head. He pursed his lips, obviously unhappy with the lack of explanation, but he spotted Ressler and another surge of borrowed anger ran through her.  
  
“Is _that_ what you call an undercover operation, Agent Ressler? The Courier opened fire on a crowd of civilians, anyone could have been killed!”  
  
Ressler looked taken aback to be on the receiving end of Red’s vitriol and Liz couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for her fellow agent. Red was apoplectic—it was easy to see why he was feared even among his fellow criminals. Come to think of it, if this was how he’d behaved while he tried to get Lorca to give up Kornish, she would have paid good money to witness it.  
  
It took Ressler a few bewildered moments before he gathered his wits and started yelling back.  
  
“That’s rich coming from you, Reddington. What gives you the right—”  
  
Liz zoned the argument out and ushered the two men into the observation room, using her body to shield the hand she had at Red’s back. She felt some of the tension drain from his posture and her own anxiety started to settle at their proximity. Meera was already waiting for them, watching The Courier through the one way mirror.  
  
“If you’re finished tearing Ressler a new arsehole, I need to borrow him for a little added muscle. I don’t feel like getting my hands dirty again today.”  


* * *

  
  
All that was gained from interrogating The Courier and the scavenger hunt through the man’s pain-resistant body was the identity of the package—a young man, in this case—and a ticking clock. The situation seemed almost hopeless to Liz and she was ashamed of herself for having so much trouble staying focused on the case. She and Red had drifted towards each other throughout the day, drawn to stand just a bit too close, to listen and observe just a bit too intently, and she prayed none of her coworkers noticed.    
  
When Red requested that Liz accompany him back to his current hideaway so he could give her more information about The Courier’s habits, she breathed a sigh of relief. She made a show of rolling her eyes to her colleagues as Red’s hand came up briefly to rest at the small of her back before he gestured for her to precede him towards the elevator, but she was glad to have an excuse to finally be alone with him. She didn’t really care if the offer was genuine or only a ruse to get her away from prying eyes. She knew it was something she needed if she was ever going to be able to concentrate enough to save the poor kid who’d been buried alive.     
  
They kept a respectable distance until they settled into his car despite the low, insistent buzzing in their veins, because neither of them knew the exact extent of the FBI’s surveillance in their own building and their paranoia, in this matter at least, was wise to indulge.  
  
Liz’s phone rang as soon as she pulled her door shut. She cursed under her breath when she saw the name on the caller ID, and suffered though another round of Tom trying to make her feel guilty for doing her job.  
  
“Bastard,” she whispered, ending the call with an annoyed jab of her finger.  
  
Red had an arm stretched along the back of the seat and watched her expectantly, not even attempting to hide the fact that he’d overheard her conversation. Not that he could have missed it even if he wanted to. Tom hadn’t exactly been quiet and neither had she.  
  
“Trouble in paradise?” Red asked, with a smug little twitch of a smile.  
  
“You know what? Screw you.” She made to climb out of the car, but he stopped her with a gentle hand on her arm and an apologetic look in his eye. She sighed, pulled the door shut again, and settled back into the seat.  
  
Red stroked his fingers along her arm, toying with the edge of her bandage. “Were you injured?”  
  
“No, that… My cover-up wore off. Ressler saw some of the tattoo.”  
  
He met her eyes again, silently asking for permission before he carefully unwrapped the gauze.  
  
They both relaxed instantly; only part of the word ‘what’ was really legible. She hadn’t been able to work up the courage to check for herself.  
  
“This is dangerous,” she said, trying her hardest to suppress a shiver as he continued to stroke her arm, this time without the barrier of the bandage between her skin and his.  
  
“They’ll find out at some point. It’s bound to happen. They already have mine on file, but I have enough tattoos, they can’t tell which is significant. Thankfully, what you said doesn’t draw much attention. Ressler and Cooper, though… When they see yours, they’ll know what to look for.”  
  
This time she failed to suppress the shiver; she let him slide his arm down across her shoulders and pull her closer to his side. Inevitable or not, it was still disconcerting to hear him say ‘when’ rather than ‘if’.  
  
“What can they do to us?”  
  
“I don’t know, I don’t know. They’d judge you for it, that’s for sure. Other than that… it’s not as if we have any choice in the matter. Being someone’s soulmate isn’t a crime.”  
  
“You’re not usually so optimistic about the pure intentions of government employees.”  
  
He gave a humorless laugh. “That’s an understatement if I’ve ever heard one,” he said, and pressed his lips to her cheek like he had the morning after the Kornish ordeal; she let out a sigh she hoped didn’t sound nearly as contented as it felt. After a moment, he moved to press another kiss to her jaw below her ear and she stiffened in his arms.  
  
“Red…”  
  
His breath tickled her cheek as he rested his forehead against her temple and said, “I know, I’m sorry, I should have better self-control than that.”  
  
“The pull can’t always be this strong. It feels like an addiction.”  
  
“It does. And you’re right. This isn’t a normal reaction. There are documented cases of soulmates knowing when the other was in danger or in pain, but it generally only happened once or twice in a lifetime, not every other week. We’re obviously in an unusual situation here.”  
  
“I couldn’t sense you before we met. At least I don’t think I could. It’s hard to say for sure.”  
  
“Who knows how many random inexplicable bouts of anxiety might have coincided with my misadventures?”  
  
“Do you think you’ve ever sensed me?”  
  
His face fell, his brows furrowing as he turned away, his eyes losing focus on anything in particular as he remembered. “Once,” he said solemnly. “Once that I’m sure of. I didn’t know what was happening at the time, but now… now I do.”  
  
The memory seemed painful for him. Liz could only think of one moment in her life that might have brought about that reaction and she couldn’t help but feel the slightest twinge of guilt that he had gone through the fear that she had felt that night, even if she couldn’t help it. To him, it surely must have seemed unwarranted and out of the blue. She wondered how he dealt with it.  
  
“It was the fire, wasn’t it? You must have felt it.”  
  
For a moment, he seemed lost again in the memory. “I did,” he said, rubbing at her scar like she did when she was nervous. “Your terror was so strong, it was all I could do to stay conscious. It reminded me of the pure, unadulterated fear of a child, when everything—even fairytale villains—are real to you and can pose a real threat to your safety. I suppose that makes sense now; I really was experiencing fear through the eyes of a child.” He shrugged, as if this was the sort of thing one discusses every day. “I always was terrified of _Hansel and Gretel_ ,” he added, almost as an afterthought.  
  
“My father used to borrow these worn out fairytale movies from the neighbor kids when we finally got a VCR,” she said, unsure why she felt the need to share something personal as well. Perhaps to make up for lying to him about the fire when he first asked. He never called her on it, even now. “The animation was a little too uncanny valley for me to deal with and they all scared the crap out of me, but I didn’t want him to feel bad, so I watched them. I cried myself to sleep whenever we watched _Little Red Riding Hood_ ; I never had the heart to tell him.”  
  
“Mmm. The fear of being led astray, of discovering someone you love isn’t who you expected them to be, that’s pretty universal. And rather prescient, considering.”  
  
It didn’t take a genius to understand Red’s implication.  
  
Tom was her rock, but that rock was eroding quicker and quicker with each disagreement and misunderstanding. With every passing day, she felt herself growing more distrustful of her husband and more receptive to the possibility that Red might be right about him. Even if Red was wrong, she was starting to see a side of Tom that was ugly no matter how you looked at it.  
  
“He really isn’t who he says he is, is he?”  
  
“Believe me, Lizzy, you’re going to get through this,” he said, “and you’ll no doubt come out stronger on the other end.” He pulled her tighter into his side and bent to press another chaste kiss to her cheek. “And don’t worry—you may not need the hunter to save you in your version of the story, but he’ll be by your side all the same.”


	4. Chapter 4

Red paced the book-filled room like a caged animal. He should have hand delivered the report to Lizzy, at least then he would’ve been able to see her and make sure she received it before she left work. If this case taught him anything, it was that relying on a courier to deliver his packages wasn’t always the best choice. She hadn’t answered his call and he hadn’t heard back from Dembe yet, who he had sent at the last minute to keep watch on her house. And now Grey was being… difficult.   
  
“I don’t understand. You turned yourself in for her. You’ve put yourself in danger for her. Now you wasted your only opportunity to access these files for her, too. If the husband is such a problem, why don’t you just have him killed? Take out the competition once and for all and then maybe you can get her out of your system.”   
  
“He’s not just some competition in the way of a petty conquest, you f—“ It took every ounce of willpower Red possessed to keep himself from finishing that sentence. He closed his eyes and massaged his temples, willing himself not to bite Grey’s head completely off. “Besides,” he said, his tone more measured, “that didn’t work out so well last time. He’s not an easy man to kill.”  
  
“Either that or Zamani botched it. You should have let me do it. You still could.”  
  
“No. We can’t take that kind of risk, not now. This situation is delicate and a hell of a lot more complicated than you seem to realize.” Grey opened his mouth to argue, but Red cut him off. “Don’t even think about it, Grey. That’s an order.”   
  
The muffled sound of an engine rumbling drew Red and Grey’s attention to the window. “I have to think about the future,” Red said quietly, as he watched Lizzy climb out of her car.  
  
Grey shook his head and stalked off to answer the door. “I hope this future is worth it.”  
  
The whole world fell away as Lizzy stepped into the room; Red’s heart clenched at the anger and confusion and loss playing across her face, but his feet felt like they were fastened to the floor and he couldn’t go to her, not with Grey in the room.   
  
Lizzy jumped when the door clicked shut behind her, leaving her alone with Red.    
  
“You got the report.” It wasn’t a question; it was beyond obvious that she had. “I should have given it to you myself. I should have been there when you read it, I don’t know what I was—”   
  
Swiftly, she crossed the room and took hold of his hands, letting the contact begin to calm them both. The buzzing in their veins faded to something tolerable as their breathing gradually began to synchronize.   
  
Once the amplified reaction to one another’s distress dissipated, Lizzy’s jumble of conflicting emotions still remained. He wanted to take her into his arms, but he resisted; he settled for a chaste kiss on her forehead before stepping back and giving her space to work out her lingering agitation.  
  
Lizzy pulled a file out of the bag she had slung over her shoulder.   
  
“I take it you got this because you let Seth express his gratitude to you. Why would you do that for me? You could have…” She tossed the file onto the coffee table and started pacing, unwittingly retracing his own steps from earlier. “If that report is true, my husband is a killer. An assassin.”  
  
“He’s not really your husband, Lizzy. Tom Keen is an alias, like all the others. Your marriage is not legally binding. If that’s any consolation.”  
  
“It is but it isn’t. I’m still stuck with the creep. He’s been calling all day. He’s even angrier now than he was when you overheard him. What if he knows that I know? What if he went for the box and could tell I touched it?”  
  
“You put it back the way you found it, I’m sure.”  
  
“I fired a bullet to run against the database. At this point I’m ready to believe he would be anal enough to notice. Do you think our marriage is just a cover or is there something more to it? And why me, specifically? Is it because of my position? Did he want to get in on the ground floor with a brand new FBI agent, who maybe wouldn’t be as suspicious? Or am I just an easy mark?”  
  
Red took a deep breath, weighing what he should tell her. He could claim ignorance without it technically being a lie. Tom was clearly there because of him, but he didn’t have the slightest idea what the man’s endgame was. However, Lizzy’s faith in him outside the comfort he could provide was worth more than keeping her completely in the dark.   
  
“I believe he was tasked to infiltrate your life in order to get to me.”  
  
Lizzy’s brows furrowed; she stopped pacing long enough to search his face. “That doesn’t make any sense. A month ago, you were only a name on a wanted poster to me. I’ve been married to Tom for _two years_.”  
  
“I understand this is confusing, but—“  
  
“Who the hell is doing this?”  
  
“I don’t know.” Lizzy scoffed and he couldn’t help but raise a condescending eyebrow. “If I did, do you really think I would let it stand? Give me some credit here.”  
  
“Do you know I’ve been having nightmares about him?”  
  
“I’d be surprised if you weren’t.”  
  
“Well, isn’t that wonderful? I can’t even—“ She closed her eyes and pressed her lips together, and shook her head as if to clear it. “I don’t want to fight with you. I don’t have anywhere else to turn in this mess. I don’t have any close friends, all our friends are _his_ friends. My colleagues, maybe they’re good for a job reference, but they don’t really trust me, let alone like me. I can’t even trust my own father to share things with me because he’s afraid I’ll worry too much.”  
  
Red took her hand, placed it flat against his chest over his heart.  
  
“You can trust me,” he said, his voice earnest, sincere. He held her gaze until it dropped to watch his thumb caressing the back of her hand.  
  
“That’s the craziest part about all this. I _do_. The person I trust most in this world is number four on the FBI’s most wanted list. Do you realize how fucked up that is? I understand that it’s you and you have a vested interest in it being you, but can you take a step back and look at it?”   
  
Tears welled in her eyes and she blinked rapidly to try to clear them. They were tears of frustration more than sadness—he felt that frustration as clearly as he would have if it had been his own and, in a way, it was. Between Tom and Red’s blacklist, he and Lizzy were in a crazy, unpredictable situation even without the added complication of being soulmates. He wasn’t accustomed to feeling so ill-prepared.  
  
He urged her closer and wrapped his arms around her, careful not to push too far too quickly. When she returned his embrace, he breathed a sigh of relief.   
  
“I don’t want this,” she said, her voice breaking as she wept into the crook of his neck. “Any of it.”  
  
“I know. I know, I’m sorry.”   
  
Red held her until her sobs dissipated and she felt stable enough to step back; he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and dried her face, carefully cleaning the smudges off her skin.  
  
“I think I ruined your shirt,” Lizzy said, straightening the damp collar that no doubt sported the same stains from her mascara that now covered his handkerchief.  
  
“Doesn’t matter.”  
  
“Thank you.” She shot him a crooked, sheepish smile that caused another layer of ice around his heart to melt. “I feel less… on the verge of a total meltdown.”  
  
“Crying can be cathartic,” he offered.  
  
“You know that’s not why.” She traced her fingers along his neck, pausing at the tiny scar she gave him the first time she tried to kill him, when the mere thought of being his soulmate was enough to drive her to murder. A lot had changed since then.  
  
“Mmm. For the sake of argument, if proximity calms, and skin contact soothes, one might assume the more intimate the contact, the more effective it is at treating these… symptoms.” He smiled when he noticed her gaze dropping to his mouth; her lips parted slightly as she tracked the movement.  
  
“So, again for the sake of argument”—he cupped the back of her head, threading his fingers through her hair—“if I were to”—he began to pull her subtly closer—“do this”—he captured her lips in a soft, tentative kiss; she exhaled roughly through her nose and pulled him towards her by the lapels, tilting her head and deepening the kiss.   
  
In that moment, the imminent threat of Tom Keen ceased to exist; there were no blacklisters, no FBI, no Concierge of Crime. There was nothing at all in their world but heat and pressure and the quickening of blood in their veins. The sheer rightness of the kiss was overwhelming and the pair quickly lost themselves in it.  
  
Reality crashed down around Red only when Lizzy’s fingers brushed scar tissue. He wrenched himself away and put a few quick steps between them, stumbling into a bookcase while she backed up until her thighs hit his desk. They stood watching each other, wild-eyed and more than a little frightened, and struggled to get their rapid breathing back to normal.  
  
Their clothing was in complete disarray. Red’s shirt and vest were unbuttoned, his belt unbuckled, and Lizzy had pulled his undershirt from his waistband to get at his skin. Her jacket had somehow found its way over the arm of the sofa, half a room away. She turned her back to readjust her bra and he realized he must have managed to unclasp it. He took the opportunity to hastily tuck his undershirt back in.   
  
Red ran a hand over the back of his head, dazed and bewildered, and sank down onto the sofa. Kisses on the cheek were one thing. Now that he’d had a proper taste of her, he wasn’t sure he would be able to put it out of his mind. From this point forward, he knew would crave it, crave _her_ , even worse than he already did. Lizzy seemed to be on the same page.  
  
“Well, shit. If that’s what kissing you is like, I wonder what would happen if we ever—”   
  
He put his head in his hands and groaned. “God, please don’t even think about it.”   
  
He felt an echo of secondhand arousal mix with his own and he looked up in time to see her flush.   
  
“You realize telling me not to think about it only compounds the problem,” she said, rubbing at her scar self-consciously.  
  
“Yes. Yes, I do. Damn it, this is such an awful distraction.”  
  
Red felt a sinking sensation in his stomach and caught her jacket disappear out of the corner of his eye. Lizzy was halfway to the door before he managed to turn around.  
  
“No, wait, I didn’t mean you should leave. It’s not your fault we react to each other like this. We’ll have to find a way to get this under control. Sending you into the situation blind is a terrible idea and it’s definitely not something I’m going to do just because it’s getting more and more difficult to keep myself from…”  
  
“Keep yourself from what?”  
  
“I figured it would be better if I didn’t verbalize it, but I think you probably have a pretty good idea.” He leaned forward, poured two mason jars full of Fredrick’s mystery liquor, and held one out to her. “Sit, please. Have a drink with me and we can decide how we’re going to handle Tom.”  
  
Liz took the jar from Red and sat an arm’s length away on the couch. She perched on the edge like she was ready to bolt at any second, but it wasn’t long before she sank back into the cushions and took a cautious sip from the makeshift glass.  
  
The unconscious need to be near each other soon took precedence over their self-imposed distance and the longer they planned and brainstormed, the closer they crept towards each other. She shifted her leg so her foot would press against his. He played absently with the wisps of hair at the nape of her neck. By the time they worked out the logistics, they found themselves pressed up against each other shoulder to knee, mere inches between their faces; his fingers traced soothing patterns under the hem of her shirt while hers rested high on his inner thigh, anything but soothing. They broke eye contact and pulled away at the same moment.  
  
“Wow. This is…”  
  
“I know.”  
  
“We might have to face the possibility that we’ll have to get it out of our systems someday. Once we deal with Tom—”  
  
“I don’t want to get you out of my system! I want…” She put a hesitant hand at the back of his neck, rubbing her thumb through the hair there. He heaved a heavy sigh. “It’s possible scratching the itch will only make it worse,” he said, staring at his feet.  
  
“Well, anything’s better than unconsciously undressing each other during a debriefing at the Post Office.”  
  
“I hate the implication that this is only attraction in overdrive. Being someone’s soulmate isn’t just a sexual connection. It’s certainly not all I feel about you and it never has been.”  
  
Lizzy coaxed his head up so she could meet his eyes. “You can’t just say something like that and not expect me to be curious.”  
  
Red swallowed hard. “You were right when you said I couldn’t have known we were soulmates when I chose you. I’ve cared about you. For a long time. I admired your drive, your ambition, your ability to rise above your past. And I only had second- and third-hand information—it can’t hold a candle to the reality of you. It wasn’t at all what I planned, Lizzy, but I… I think I would have fallen in love with you eventually regardless of whether or not you were my soulmate.”  
  
“None of that explains _why_ you chose me.”  
  
“No, I suppose it doesn’t.”  
  
He could tell she wasn’t satisfied with his evasiveness, but she didn’t press him. She poured herself a couple more fingers of whatever it was they were drinking and sat back with her side against his.    
  
Someday, she would know the whole truth about their connection. For now, he would rest easy—as easy as he ever did, at least—knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt he’d chosen the right person.   
  
After all, fate apparently agreed with him.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Tom?”
> 
> “Hey, babe. Did you solve your case? Gee, do you think you’ll get a promotion soon, with all the overtime you’re putting in? It would be great to have a little extra money in the bank,” he said, his voice monotone, emotionless, a sick parody of an interested spouse. It sent chills through Liz’s body.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, the chapter from hell. There'll be one more chapter, because this one refused to cooperate for the longest time (it still feels meh, tbh) and I felt like the confrontation here had to happen on its own. And yes, at some point, there will be a sequel.

It was the box. Of course it was the box. It was the best explanation for his angry phone calls, especially considering his refusal to tell her what he was angry about.  
  
Still, an icy fist clamped down around her heart when she saw the damned thing open on the floor at Tom’s feet, passports and cash in neat stacks next to the handgun. That would have to be her first priority—getting the gun well away from where he could reach it easily. After that, well… hopefully she could keep him talking long enough to figure out where she stood.  
  
Steeling herself for the inevitable confrontation, Liz discreetly hit send on her phone and set it down on the counter with her keys.  
  
“Tom?”  
  
“Hey, babe. Did you solve your case? Gee, do you think you’ll get a promotion soon, with all the overtime you’re putting in? It would be great to have a little extra money in the bank,” he said, his voice monotone, emotionless, a sick parody of an interested spouse. It sent chills through Liz’s body.   
  
She didn’t want this dispassionate, stone-faced facade. She wanted anger, the same anger she’d gotten every time her phone rang in the last day. She could work with anger. She’d been counting on it, in fact. She needed him distracted. If she couldn’t provoke him into losing his temper, even if he faked it, she wasn’t sure what she would do.  
  
“Where did you find that?”  
  
“Don’t play dumb, Liz. You know where I found it,” he said, looking up at her with eyes full of disdain. And there it was, that first spark of irritation. She couldn’t help feeling just the tiniest bit relieved.  
  
“Why the hell were you tearing up perfectly good carpet?”   
  
“Who cares why I tore up the carpet? I’m glad I did! What is all this stuff? Are you some kind of spy now? A double agent or something? Do you even work for the FBI?”  
  
Liz blinked in surprise. That wasn’t the direction she expected him to take. She was offended he would even pretend that he thought the box belonged to her; how stupid did he think she was? She mentally shook herself. None of it mattered. Just play along, keep him talking.  
  
“Wait a minute, you think it’s mine?”   
  
“Jesus, Liz, what am I supposed to think? You obviously knew about it, I found it under the floorboards in _our_ house, and that stupid carving looks a hell of a lot like the goddamn scar on your wrist. You can’t deny it’s suspicious as hell.”  
  
“Why would I have a bunch of passports with _your_ face on them?”  
  
 “How the hell should I know? I’m trying to give you the benefit of the doubt here. Maybe you had them made so just in case you got burned, we could run together. That would almost be sweet if it wasn’t _completely fucking insane_.”   
  
“It’s. Not. My. _Box_. I found it while I was on my hands and knees, trying to scrub _your blood_ out of the carpet.”  
  
“Oh, this is my fault now? That’s great, Liz. Blame the victim.” He sprang to his feet and she tried her hardest not to flinch; thankfully, he did nothing but start to pace.  
  
“Victim? How are you a victim in this situation?”  
  
“I think it’s pretty damn obvious somebody’s trying to set me up. I honestly don’t understand how you can be so blind that you can’t see that. Unless…” He narrowed his eyes at her, his mouth twisting in feigned rage. “Unless that’s what this is about. Did I foil your plan? Are you upset because poor stupid Tom found your box and you can’t use him as your patsy anymore?”  
  
“What the hell is wrong with you?” She watched him stalk back and forth, careful to keep herself between him and the box. “Do you spend all your time after school sitting around coming up with conspiracy theories? I don’t think I’ve ever met somebody as paranoid as you sound right now.”  
  
“Something’s been different about you, Liz. Even before I found this, I felt it. I don’t even know who you are anymore. Ever since you started this job, you’ve been distant, distracted. I can’t help it, my brain keeps throwing all these explanations at me. I don’t know, it’s almost as if you…” He trailed off, his eyes widening almost comically.   
  
“Almost as if I what?  
  
“You met him, didn’t you?”  
  
Dread began to trickle into her bloodstream to mix with the adrenaline already coursing through her system. She had been hoping to get through this without Tom finding out about Red, or at least what he was to her. “Who?”  
  
”Your soulmate. I’m right, aren’t I? That’s why you’ve barely even looked at me since that nut tried to kill me. God, Liz, I almost died and this is what I get for it—you falling in love with someone else.”  
  
“I’m not in love with anyone, you bastard!”  
  
“Really, Liz? No one?”  
  
“The way you’re acting right now? Yeah, no one.”  
  
“You’re not denying that you met him.”  
  
“What use would it be? You wouldn’t believe me either way. Besides, it shouldn’t matter if I met my soulmate, I’m married to _you_.”  
  
“You wouldn’t be the first woman in the world to cheat on her husband, Liz. Are you having an affair with him?”  
  
“What? No!”  
  
“But you want to, don’t you? That’s what this is all about, isn’t it? All the excuses, all the times you didn’t even come to bed—I’m not good enough for you anymore. How the hell am I supposed to compete with your _soulmate_ , Liz? Damn it, I knew this would happen!”  
  
“That’s not what you said, you said it was fine, you said you didn’t believe in any of it!”  
  
“I lied to you, Lizzy! I lied so you wouldn’t leave me and you were _just so desperate_ for someone to love you, you bought it.”  
  
“Why are you saying this?”  
  
“Because it’s the truth. Because for once in your life, someone’s going to tell you the truth, no matter how much you don’t want to hear it.”  
  
Just then, her phone buzzed on the counter; Tom snatched it and started to scroll through her messages.   
  
“What the hell are you doing? Give that to me!”  
  
“Are you soulmates with some kid from a pizza place or is this code? ‘ _Lizzy, how did he take it?_ ’” he read, his tone mocking. “He calls you Lizzy? Nobody calls you Lizzy but me and your dad. And how did I take what? Did you come here to tell me you’re leaving me?” Suddenly, he grabbed her wrist none too gently, looming over her. “Because that would be a really shitty thing to do.”  
  
There were a million different ways to defend herself, to ask him why he cared if she left him if she was such a horrible person; if he thought she was a spy or if she was setting him up, or even if she was only cheating on him, why would he want her to stay? However, there wasn’t time for any of that, no need to stall and prolong the encounter and increase the chances of failure.  
  
“If he knew you laid a finger on me,” she hissed, “he would make sure he had you gutted properly this time.”   
  
His grip slackened immediately and she noticed a flicker of fear and recognition in his eyes before they grew cold in a way she had never seen before. In that moment, his mask dropped completely for the first time and he was no longer an angry, wronged husband with control issues or a bland imitation of a perfect spouse. Behind the mask he was a stranger, a monster.  
  
“Of course,” Tom spat. “I should have known it was Reddington.”  
  
Hearing Red’s name on Tom’s lips lit a fuse in Liz. Before he got a chance to grab her again, she hauled back and landed a solid punch to his jaw. He staggered away from the blow and an arm came from nowhere to tighten around his neck in a chokehold. He struggled against the grip, but his brain was too addled from the punch and the lack of oxygen for him to put up much of a fight and soon his body went limp.  
  
Liz helped Red carry Tom’s lifeless body to a chair.  
  
“Is he dead?” she asked. She wasn’t sure what she wanted the answer to be.  
  
Red brushed off his hands and straightened his suit. “Unconscious. We need to have a word with him, don’t you think?”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reddington took his sweet time acknowledging Tom’s return to consciousness, but Lizzy watched him like he was a bug she thought might skitter away if she took her eyes off him.

Two voices—low, hushed, and familiar—served as a beacon to help pull Tom from unconsciousness. He blinked his eyes sluggishly in a struggle to get his vision to clear, to focus enough to take in his surroundings.  
  
He was restrained, tied to a chair in his own living room. Across the coffee table sat Raymond Reddington, in all his smug, well-dressed glory, and Lizzy, whose face hardened as soon as she noticed Tom’s attention. Reddington had an arm draped casually along the back of the sofa behind Lizzy and their legs were touching. The size of the sofa only emphasized how ridiculously close they were to each other; there was no earthly reason to sit pressed together like that.  
  
He already knew they were soulmates. Did they really need to rub it in his face? Hell, it barely even scratched the surface of the mystery of their connection to each other—but, by God, there were a lot of people who would pay handsomely for the intel. Lizzy had become a much more valuable bargaining chip than anybody ever realized and she was already extremely valuable, an inexplicable vulnerability in Reddington’s otherwise impenetrable armor.  
  
Reddington took his sweet time acknowledging Tom’s return to consciousness, but Lizzy watched him like he was a bug she thought might skitter away if she took her eyes off him. As if he had any chance, considering how effectively he was tied up. The sheer overkill involved made him suspect it was Reddington’s handiwork, and the knots confirmed it. Somewhere deep down, the man was still a sailor.  
  
The coffee table was set with a platter of cheese and crackers, and a bottle of wine. He might as well have been a guest at a dinner party, if not for the restraints. He half expected them to offer him a glass of wine. He was better off if they didn’t; chances are it would be laced with something like sodium pentothal, or worse.  
  
Reddington took a slow draw from his own glass while regarding Tom over the rim. He savored the wine with a satisfied hum and placed it back onto the coffee table.    
  
“Thomas! So glad you could join us.” Reddington glanced at his watch. “It’s about time, too. We were starting to think you would never wake up.” He leaned back into the couch slowly, and smiled a thin smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “That’s quite a bruise you’ve got there. Can you speak, or did Lizzy do the world a favor and break your jaw?”  
  
Tom worked his jaw experimentally, finding it sore and swollen, but not broken.  
  
“Fuck off, Reddington,” he spat, his voice hoarse. He coughed reflexively, trying to clear his aching throat to no avail.  
  
“Charming. Lizzy tells me you two were having a fascinating conversation before you took your little catnap. I thought we could pick up where you left off before we decide what do with you. Why don’t you start by explaining how you know who I am?”  
  
“It’s my job to know who you are, no more, no less.”  
  
“Your job. It was also presumably your job to insinuate yourself into Lizzy’s life, to prey on her hopes and dreams, to betray her trust, the trust of a woman who _loved_ you… All of that, just to get to me, am I right? And because it was _your job_ , that somehow makes it OK?”  
  
“You’re one to talk. How many atrocities are you responsible for, Reddington? In the last hour?”  
  
“I’m sorry, we’ll have to play ‘ _Who’s the Bigger Psychopath?_ ’ some other time. Right now, I want answers. Answers that you’re going to give me, because you’re not a complete idiot, are you, Tom? You know how this works. You give me the information we need and you come out of this with all your limbs still attached.”  
  
“I think I’d rather take my chances with the FBI. I’m sure they’ll be very interested in what I have to say about their high-value off-the-books informant and his… handler? Is that what they’re calling it these days, Liz? Do you _handle_ Reddington the way you _handle_ me? I bet he loves it when you—”  
  
The slap landed with a jarring, stinging crack against Tom’s already injured face. Liz shook out her tingling hand; Reddington took hold of it and pressed a gentle kiss against her palm, soothing her.  
  
“You’re being awfully optimistic that we even plan to let you see the inside of a jail cell. Maybe Lizzy would like to turn you into a pincushion. She does have a fondness for sharp objects,” Reddington said, his own fondness for Lizzy obvious in his tone—it was adoration, pure and simple.  
  
If everything that had happened since Tom regained consciousness so far had been a performance, this certainly was not. He felt a surge of anger and jealousy twist in his gut, not because he cared for Liz, but because he’d given up his chance to have the kind of connection she and Reddington shared when he took on this assignment, and now it was falling down around his ears. Unless he weaseled his way out of his current predicament, he would likely never see his own soulmate again.  
  
If Tom’s boss was in front of him now, he would cheerfully kill him for putting him through this. He was walking a very fine line and frustration made him reckless, the need to sting, to lash out, taking precedence over his sense of self-preservation.  
  
“Hey, Lizzy, maybe they’ll lock you up, too. Wouldn’t that be something? I mean, between me and Reddington, you have a hell of a history of sleeping with the enemy. If they know what’s good for them, they shouldn’t trust you at all.”  
  
Liz bristled again and Reddington tensed next to her. She turned to meet his eyes and the two of them had something of a silent exchange before Reddington stood. He held out a hand to pull Liz up next to him and lead her towards the kitchen.  
  
Tom craned his neck as far as he could, catching a glimpse of the pair of them in a reflection on a picture frame. Liz took Reddington’s hands in hers and Reddington stepped forward to press his lips to her forehead, all in total silence. It wasn’t an act, the closeness, the touching… It was a necessity. They grounded each other. She could claim she wasn’t in love with him all she wanted, but she hadn’t looked at Tom that way for a long time, if she ever had.  
  
After what felt like an eternity, Reddington and Liz returned. He downed the rest of his wine and set about clearing off the coffee table, handing the empty glasses and the untouched snacks to Lizzy before sitting down on the edge of the table in front of Tom and pulling a leather bag into his lap.  
  
“So let me see if I understand where we stand,” he said, unbuckling the bag with deliberate slowness. “You are officially refusing to answer our questions.”  
  
Tom stayed silent, watching warily as Liz came to stand next to them. Reddington tossed open the flap of the bag and took out a gun.  
  
“And if we turn you over to the FBI, you’ll let them in on our little secret?” Reddington started screwing a silencer into place with practiced ease. “Well, that really is a shame. But it does make our decision a whole lot easier now, doesn’t it? What do you think, Lizzy? Fast?” He pressed the gun against Tom’s skull. “Or slow?” He moved the gun to dig into his gut.  
  
“Wait.” Liz stopped Reddington with a hand on his shoulder, making him lean back and pull the gun away. Tom looked up at her with a self-satisfied smirk. Reddington was bluffing, that much was obvious. His posturing was a ploy to trick Tom into giving up information. He wouldn’t shoot him until that well was dry and, since Tom had no intention of talking anytime soon, he felt relatively safe.  
  
The gravity of his situation really only began to sink in when he registered the expression on Liz’s face. This wasn’t a reprieve. She didn’t stop Reddington because she wanted to protect Tom. He’d seen enough of her temper, her aggression, to realize what was going on.  
  
“You know, when I first met Red, I couldn’t deal with the idea that I was meant to be with anyone other than you. So much so that I tried to kill him. _Three times_. Funny thing was, he didn’t care. He’s just crazy enough to appreciate it. I think it endeared me to him.  
  
“That’s something I haven’t experienced often in my life, unconditional loyalty. I’ve had it with Sam and now with Red, but you… I was _supposed_ to have it with you, but obviously that was a lie.” She laughed humorlessly. “I guess I was trying to kill the wrong person.”  
  
She turned to Reddington, who handed over the gun without hesitation. A wave of panic crashed over Tom as she thumbed off the safety and he felt the muzzle of the gun flat against his forehead for the second time that night.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Who is your employer, Tom?” Red asked, cool and calm, speaking for the first time since he handed Liz the gun. Tom ignored him, keeping his attention solely on Liz.
> 
> “Please, Lizzy—“
> 
> “Stop calling me Lizzy!” She pushed the gun hard against his forehead, bending his neck back at a painful angle.
> 
> “All right!” he yelled, loud enough to make her ears ring with the echo of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know why I even try to estimate how many chapters these things are going to have. I rarely manage to get it right. :P There is—probably—only one more after this one, and then a sequel.

“Wait! Wait, Lizzy! You’ve only known him for a month, but this is me, Lizzy. You gotta understand, I’m your husband, _you know me_.”   
  
“SHUT UP! You can’t play the husband card anymore, you lying bastard!” Liz clenched her teeth and leaned closer to Tom. “You,” she said, enunciating each word clearly, “are a total stranger to me.”  
  
“All right, OK, I get it, OK, just hear me out!”  
  
“What could you _possibly_ say that would make any difference to me right now?”  
  
“I have information, lots of it! I can tell you things that your dad won’t tell you, that Reddington won’t, things they don’t even know about. I _know things_ about you, Lizzy. I can tell you who you are, who your parents are, why it’s all such a big secret.”  
  
Liz tightened her grip around the gun. “If you know, other people know,” she said, pleased her voice didn’t waver.  
  
“But they’ll never tell you! They can’t! They’re too afraid, afraid of you, of what you’ll do.”   
  
She glanced at Red, who watched her impassively. He showed no hint of reaction to Tom’s words, nothing to sway her one way or the other. Whatever choice she made about Tom would be her decision and her decision only.   
  
Even if Tom was including him in his mysterious ‘they’, at this point she trusted Red to help her find answers a hell of a lot more than she trusted Tom. As far as she could tell, Red had never lied to her. Kept her in the dark, sure, which was without a doubt frustrating, but she could certainly understand the logic behind it. Someday, she would get the whole truth from him, she was certain of it. She knew no such thing with Tom.  
  
Tom seized on her momentary hesitation, mistaking it for temptation, for possible leniency yet again.  
  
“You can turn me in, Lizzy, I’ll surrender, we can work together, you’ll see.”  
  
“You _just_ threatened to expose us—“  
  
“I won’t! I promise I won’t, I won’t say a thing! Turn me in, it’s fine, I deserve it. Maybe…Maybe I can help, do some good. Maybe they can protect me.”  
  
“Who do you need protecting from?”  
  
“My employer. He… When he finds out I botched this, he’ll come after me. He’ll come after you. There won’t be anywhere that’s safe—“  
  
“Who is your employer, Tom?” Red asked, cool and calm, speaking for the first time since he handed Liz the gun. Tom ignored him, keeping his attention solely on Liz.  
  
“Please, Lizzy—“  
  
 _“Stop calling me Lizzy!”_ She pushed the gun hard against his forehead, bending his neck back at a painful angle.  
  
“All right!” he yelled, loud enough to make her ears ring with the echo of it.  
  
After Tom’s outburst, the room fell into an unnatural silence. Tom scrambled, frantic and desperate behind wild eyes, for a new tactic. His eyes narrowed as he looked back and forth between Liz and Red, and a sick feeling settled in Liz’s stomach.  
  
“You know they’re going to find out, don’t you?” he asked. “I don’t have to tell them, they’ll figure it out on their own. I don’t know how you’ve kept it a secret this long, you couldn’t be more obvious if you tried.   
  
“Do you realize what they’re going to do once they know? They’ll take him away, they’ll keep you from him. He’s not just some run-of-the-mill bank robber, Liz. They’ll bury him. They’ll put him in a hole and he’ll never see daylight again. You’ll never see him again.   
  
“The two of you together, you’re _dangerous_. They’re never going to let that stand. I can help you, both of you, you just have to give me a chance to—”  
  
Tom wouldn’t get a chance to tell her whatever it was he planned to do; he never even got a chance to finish that one sentence. It was the itch of madness she felt at the prospect of forced separation from Red that pushed Liz over the edge; she pulled the trigger and the itch began to fade as the life drained from Tom’s face.   
  
She waited for panic to set in. She waited for regret, for disgust, for shock—nothing came. What she felt was relief, a bone-deep relief that there would be no more confusion, no more second-guessing herself, no more fear or dread, at least where Tom was concerned. It was over.  
  
Liz had taken lives before—in self-defense and in defense of others. In the past, she hadn’t felt anything, hadn’t _let_ herself feel anything but justified. What she felt now? She was sure it wasn’t appropriate, given the situation. Given any situation.  
  
She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath to compose herself. She was afraid to move, because the sudden feeling of freedom coursing through her system urged her to celebrate, to laugh, to smile, and, most of all, to take advantage of her awareness of Red, now that the last obvious obstacle between them had been eliminated.   
  
She didn’t want to think of it that way, didn’t want to consider the possibility that the only thing that had kept her from jumping into bed with him had been Tom’s continued existence. It left her with a bitter taste in her mouth, the thought that she had killed her husband just so she could be with her soulmate.  
  
It wasn’t true. She knew it wasn’t true. She killed Tom because of what he’d done to her, what he put her through, the havoc he might have caused if she let him live. She hadn’t killed her husband—not really. Tom Keen had never truly existed and now the man who used that name was gone for good.   
  
A light tugging on her sleeve shook her out of her reverie.   
  
“Is it all right if I take the gun now?” Red asked, the fabric of her jacket pinched between his fingers. She looked down, surprised to see the gun still in her hand. She passed it to him and he immediately began to disassemble it and place it back in his bag.  
  
Her gaze was drawn to the chair in front of her like a magnet. Rivulets of Tom’s blood started to drip onto her carpet, leaving stains much like the ones that had started her down the path of discovery.   
  
“My father…” Liz trailed off. She cleared her throat, swallowed hard around the lump in it. “My adoptive father—”  
  
“Sam,” Red offered. She blinked, brought up short; she wasn’t sure why she was surprised he knew Sam’s name. She certainly shouldn’t have been.    
  
“Yeah. Sam always told me my parents were dead.”  
  
“They are. As far as I know, they are. I have no reason to believe otherwise.”   
  
Liz tore her eyes away from Tom’s body to search Red’s face. It wasn’t like him to volunteer facts about her past so succinctly. She wondered if Tom’s death would mark a turning point in that regard, or if this was just a one time moment of openness.   
  
“What do we do now?”  
  
“I’ll notify Mr. Kaplan,” he said, pulling a burner phone from his bag before standing and leading her away from the living room. “She’ll handle the clean up.”   
  
“She?”  
  
He shrugged. “Come on. You don’t need to see this part,” he said, ushering her towards the staircase. “I insisted on watching once against Mr. Kaplan’s advice. I never did again.”  
  
“I would think you’d be used to things like this by now.”  
  
Red gestured for her to precede him upstairs; she felt him close behind as she started climbing. He gripped the handrail tightly, hauling himself up after her, crowding close as if to keep her from turning around and heading back downstairs. “Well, you’d be wrong,” he said, his breath stirring her hair as he spoke.  
  
At the top, Liz headed for her bedroom and Red went past her to the window, peered down into the street through the curtain. He poked at the screen on his cell phone and held it to his ear.   
  
“Mr. Kaplan. Yes, like we talked about. Thank you.” Laying the phone on the windowsill, he turned back to Liz and quirked a smile. “She’ll be here soon.” He studied her face for a long moment, the smile dissolving as quickly as it formed. “How are you?”  
  
“I just killed my husband.”  
  
“That doesn’t answer my question.”  
  
“Deflection isn’t fun when you’re on the receiving end, is it?” She shook her head. “I shouldn’t be feeling what I’m feeling right now.”  
  
“I don’t think there’s any right way to feel after—“  
  
“You don’t understand.” She felt a frisson of… something… flood through her body, something not quite hers, but very similar. The more she focused on it, the more his breathing picked up. “Or maybe you do.”  
  
“What are you feeling?” he asked, as if he hadn’t already noticed like she had, as if his white-knuckle grip on the windowsill didn’t mean he felt the same thing.  
  
“Exhilarated,” she said. “Aroused. _Alive_.”   
  
“Perhaps this wasn’t the wisest place to wait,” he said, and she had a sudden and acute awareness of the bed to her left. She took a deep, cleansing breath and let it out slowly through her lips. The air was fresh up here, no gunpowder, no coppery, metallic tang.  
  
“Do we really not want to do this, or do we only think we _shouldn’t_ want to?”  
  
“I’ve wanted you since that first day at the Post Office, when you walked down those stairs. That doesn’t make it a good idea,” he said, clearly trying to convince himself as much as he was trying to convince her.  
  
“Killing Tom probably wasn’t a good idea either.”  
  
Red pushed off from the windowsill and approached her, steady and deliberate. “I think it’s the best idea you’ve had in a long time,” he said, his voice earnest.  
  
“Well, then maybe we deserve a couple questionable ones.”  
  
He fell silent for a moment, head tilted slightly to the side as he contemplated what she said. “I’m sure there’s a flaw in that logic somewhere but I can’t find it in myself to care.”  
  



	8. Chapter 8

Liz and Red stood mirroring each other, shifting restlessly from foot to foot, each waiting for the other to make the first move.   
  
Everything in Liz’s life conspired to bring her to this moment. Objectively, that was true for anything and everything she had ever experienced, but this felt significant in a way she couldn’t put into words. It was as if the universe itself was waiting for what came next, the very air around the two of them heavy with anticipation.  
  
“Do we have to worry about Mr. Kaplan checking in, or will she handle everything on her own?”  
  
“She’s very discreet,” he said, reaching out and rubbing a tendril of her hair between his fingers. “In every area.”  
  
Liz turned the lock on the door anyway. She took a step toward him, close enough to feel his body heat. She wanted to touch him but didn’t dare, not yet.   
  
She thought she should be nervous or scared or wary about what was going to happen—their kiss earlier that day had stolen every conscious thought and every bit of self-control they possessed. Just the idea of going further should frighten her at least as much. It didn’t. Facing the reality of it now, she found she felt rather the opposite.  
  
“This isn’t why I killed him,” she said, studying his face. “You know that, right?”  
  
“Of course.”  
  
She nodded, bringing a hand shaky with adrenaline up to play with the neat knot on his tie. A moment passed and then another and she brought her other hand up to help loosen the knot. She left the tie draped under his collar and unbuttoned the top few buttons on his shirt, brushing it aside to rest her hand over his pounding heart, her fingers covering the words of his tattoo.  
  
Her mind must have been playing tricks on her because she could have sworn the ink beneath her fingers grew hotter under her touch. The lines of her own tattoo tingled in response, an electric charge racing along the bright red letters.   
  
She needed this. Foolish or not. Reckless or not. They both did. For the sake of their sanity, if nothing else. They couldn’t risk losing control like they had earlier, not if they wanted to have any hope of keeping their connection a secret.   
  
Now. It had to be now. Before it got any worse.  
  
“Lie down on the bed,” she whispered, lips just shy of brushing his. She stepped back and waited for him to comply.  
  
He raised an eyebrow at her bluntness. “This might go smoother with less clothing.”  
  
“Take off your jacket and shoes. Leave the rest.”  
  
His face broke out into a slow grin, his eyes held a mixture of fondness and pride. He immediately shrugged his jacket off his shoulders and folded it neatly before handing it to her. Next, he toed off his shoes and pushed them aside to stand before her in stocking feet.   
  
They were only a few inches apart in height to begin with; now they were nearly eye to eye. She took a stuttering breath and licked her lips, watching his eyes track the movement.   
  
He turned abruptly to climb onto the bed; she tossed his jacket onto the armchair and stopped him with a hand on his belt. Slowly, she unbuckled it and slid it free of its belt loops; his breathing sped up as he watched. Once she was finished, she placed her hand at the center of his chest and gave him a good solid shove towards the bed. He let himself be pushed off balance and landed with a grunt, catching himself on his elbows.   
  
He broke eye contact only long enough to move up the bed to lean against the headboard. She drank him in, propped up in the center of her bed, his growing excitement becoming more and more obvious pressed against the front of his trousers.  
  
“Come here,” he said, his voice husky, an octave or two lower than usual.  
  
His belt buckle hit the floor with a thud that reverberated in the otherwise still air as she bent to pull off her own boots. She slid her pants off her hips, letting them fall to the floor as well before stepping out of them, and crawled her way up the bed, her eyes never leaving his.   
  
She stopped with her hands and knees on either side of his body; he craned his neck to look up at her, but didn’t pull her in for a kiss, didn’t lean forward, didn’t touch her at all. By unspoken agreement, they avoided excess skin contact, unsure how they would react, if it would calm or inflame.  
  
She settled down into his lap, the hard length of him nudging at her sensitive inner thigh through his trousers. Her anticipation ratcheted up a few notches; she felt him twitch beneath her in response. She skimmed her fingers down the line of buttons on his shirt until she reached his waistband, and toyed with the fastening at the top of his fly. A twist of her fingers had it undone, and his hands clenched in the bedsheets near her bare legs.  
  
“I probably won’t last long,” she warned.  
  
“God, I hope not, neither will I.” The desperation in his voice sent a brutal, pleasurable jolt along her nerve endings. She closed her eyes, breathing slow and deep.   
  
“You… I need you to…” She trailed off, clenching her jaw. She felt him fumbling in between them, taking over where she left off. He pushed his hips off the mattress and shoved his trousers and boxers down his thighs as far as he could and then rested his hands at her waist, the heat from them permeating her blouse as if she wore nothing at all.  
  
Once she could focus again, she braced herself with a hand on his shoulder, shifting up onto her knees over him; he slid her underwear to the side with one hand and reached down to position himself against her with the other. He pressed up as she sank down with agonizing, painstaking slowness. They both sighed in pure relief when she settled against him fully.  
  
The room appeared in technicolor in the fading afternoon sunlight, details she’d never noticed before becoming vivid all at once. The green and gray and blue of his eyes, the blond of his eyelashes, the white scattered through the growing stubble on his face, the hair at his temples, his sideburns.  
  
She felt more alert, her synapses fired quicker. She had never been so aware of her own heartbeat. She’d never been so aware of somebody else’s.  
  
“There’s spatter on your vest,” she said, her voice breathy as she began to make tiny rocking motions with her hips.   
  
“We’ll burn it,” he growled, and then he leaned forward, finally closing the distance to capture her lips in a searing kiss. He moved beneath her, dragging her along into a spiraling excitement more intense than anything she’d ever experienced before.   
  
There was something perverse about doing this here, in the bed she shared with Tom, while his body cooled in a chair downstairs. She sped up her movements, a nagging thought at the back of her mind that she was well and truly screwed up.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I think I’m developing quite an appreciation for the vagaries of our situation."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ten is a nice round number, right? :P

Time slowed to a crawl as Liz and Red lay next to each other, chests heaving and bodies trembling.  Aftershocks ran rampant through their systems and they were much too hypersensitive to even think about touching for a long while. They stole glances at each other, trying to gauge what the other was thinking beyond the static-like feedback their connection afforded.  
  
Red regained control of his limbs first, gingerly tucking himself back inside his boxers and fastening his trousers before his shaky arms fell immediately back to the mattress.  
  
Liz cleared her throat. “As mind-blowing as that was,” she began, more than a little hesitant, “I hope in the future, it’s not quite so… I mean, don’t take this the wrong way, but I don’t think I could…”  
  
Red’s chuckle was a balm to her frayed nerves. “Don’t worry, we’re on the same page.” He heaved himself onto his side, propping himself up on his elbow, leaning towards her. “I enjoy a frenzied encounter every once in a while as much as the next guy, but I would much rather take my time, savor every moment, learn the ins and outs of what pleases my partner.”  
  
By the time he finished speaking, their faces were a hair’s breadth apart. His eyes danced with undisguised mischief and her breath caught in her chest. He knew exactly what his words were doing to her.  
  
“You know,” she said, slightly breathless, “somehow that doesn’t surprise me at all.”  
  
The corners of his mouth twitched up into a smile. “May I?” he asked, his hand hovering over her belly where her shirt had ridden up.  
  
“At this point, you could do whatever you wanted to me and I wouldn’t complain.”  
  
“Never give me carte blanche; I might just take you up on it.” He pulled her closer to him and claimed her lips, pushing his thigh between her legs. “You, however, are welcome to do anything you want to me.”  
  
“Anything I want?”  
  
“Anything.”  
  
She studied Red’s face, the curve of his lips, the arch of his brow, the warmth of his gaze.  
  
“I want you inside me again,” she said in a rush; she drank in his surprise and licked her lips, gaining confidence. “I want your weight on me, bearing down.” Matching words to action, she wrapped her arms around his waist and pulled him against her before taking one of his earlobes between her teeth. “I want to feel you come,” she purred into his ear.  
  
He sucked in a breath through his teeth. “God, Lizzy.”  
  
She rubbed herself against him and felt him begin to stiffen in response. He froze, peering down between their bodies as he braced himself on his elbows above her. His facial expression was priceless.  
  
“Son of a bitch. I do not miss being a teenage boy.” Liz tossed back her head and laughed, her fingers curling into his shirt. “Honestly. We have work to do,” he said, his own laughter rumbling pleasantly through his body where it rested against hers.  
  
She leaned up to nip playfully at his neck and he tilted his head back immediately to give her better access.  
  
“Mmm. That’s not helping my dilemma in the slightest but feel free to continue.” He ran a hand under her blouse again, drawing his fingers up the soft skin of her abdomen, gentle but firm enough not to tickle. He stopped at the edge of her bra, seeming to contemplate something for a moment before shifting back onto his knees. Decision made, he coaxed her up so they could pull the shirt over her head.  
  
“Do we have time?” she asked, leaning forward so he could unclasp her bra without fumbling.  
  
“We’ll make time,” he said, and kissed her again; he slipped his fingers around the waistband of her underwear, helped her slide them down and off her legs. She went to work on his fly again, this time with steady hands.  
  
His attention fell then to her breasts and he dipped his head to move for them but before he managed, she pulled him towards her with the ends of his tie and captured his mouth in another searing kiss.  
  
They had the clarity of mind now to explore each other properly—to tease, to touch, to taste. To observe and memorize. To be _lovers_ , not just for the sake of satisfying a compulsion, but out of a genuine desire to satisfy each other.  
  
Red pulled himself out of range of their kisses to take stock of Liz, panting and flushed beneath him. He traced the blotchy pink down her throat and chest, leaning down to run his tongue between her breasts, catching a salty bead of sweat before finally sucking one of her nipples into his mouth. The roughness of his tongue against the delicate skin sent twisting tingles of sensation along her nerve endings, a heavy heat settling once again between her legs.  
  
She maneuvered his head up from her chest so she could meet his eyes.  
  
“Now?” he asked.  
  
She nodded. “Now.”  
  
Still slick as she was from their first round, he slid inside deeper and easier than either of them expected with a shock of pleasure that bordered on pain. He rested his forehead against hers, giving her a chance to adjust, himself a chance to catch his breath.  
  
After a short while, she raked her nails lightly up his neck, hoping to spur him on. “Go ahead,” she said.  
  
Red held her gaze as he pulled back and rocked forward again slowly, dragging a low moan out of them both. She wrapped her legs around his hips, matching his movements thrust for thrust. A tremor ran through his thigh as he continued to move against her.  
  
“God,” she gasped. “This is ridiculous.”  
  
“Oh, yes, it certainly is,” he said, his voice nearly a growl. “Ridiculous, maddening, terrifying, but good Lord, the satisfaction almost makes up for it. I think I’m developing quite an appreciation for the vagaries of our situation.”  
  
Liz spared half a thought in wonder at how he could still be so multisyllabic at this point and pulled his head back down to hers, kissing him deeply; he parted his lips for her, groaning into her mouth as their shared sensations began to catch up to them, multiplying exponentially with each passing second. They broke apart again, gasping for breath.  
  
“God, I love you. Everything. All of you. I…” With a strangled moan, his thrusts sped up, growing erratic and irregular. He angled his hips, pressing and dragging himself against a spot that made her dig her fingernails into his shirt, surely leaving marks on the skin underneath. He moaned into her shoulder, holding her tightly to him as he came, pulling her over the edge with him into a swirling maelstrom of ecstasy.  
  
Red rested his head on her chest, dazed and panting, and Liz brushed her lips lazily against the short hair on his scalp as she tried to convince her fingers to loosen their death grip on his shirt. It was a struggle even to keep her eyes open, with the warmth of Red’s body enveloping her in comfort and satiation. If she closed her eyes just for a moment, it wouldn’t do any harm, would it?  


* * *

  
  
Liz woke slowly from a particularly pleasant dream, gradually growing more and more aware of the unusual feeling of her face being peppered with tiny kisses. She recognized the fabric of her own duvet against her skin and a surge of alarm spiked through her body. Suddenly, she was loath to open her eyes. What if none of the events of the past day had been real? Sure, it would mean she wasn’t a killer, but it would also mean Tom was still in the picture, still a potential threat. Possibly still with her at that very moment.  
  
The man bent to whisper in her ear. “Welcome back. Did you enjoy your nap?”  
  
 _Red_. Relief flooded through her at the sound of his voice.  
  
“Oh, thank God.” Red raised an eyebrow in question. “I thought for a minute I might have been dreaming.”  
  
“No,” he said, a crooked half-smile on his face. “But that means we still have to face the music. We should talk to Mr. Kaplan before she starts reorganizing your knickknacks out of sheer boredom.”  
  
Liz stopped him when he moved to roll off her. “What you said before,” she said, searching his face. “You meant it?”  
  
He leaned down and captured her lips for one last lingering kiss. “Of course I meant it,” he said, his voice earnest. “I don’t use the word ‘love’ lightly.”  
  
“Good,” she said, her voice firm, confident in a way she didn’t really feel. “Because I really think I’m starting to fall for you and if I was alone in it this time, I think I might lose my mind.”  


* * *

  
  
After making themselves somewhat presentable, Liz and Red made their way downstairs. The air was clean and fresh now, with no hint of gunpowder or the lingering metallic tang of blood. Mr. Kaplan had obviously worked her magic on the gruesome scene in her living room. The only evidence that anything had changed at all was the rug missing from under the chair Tom died in.  
  
Liz was surprised to see an older woman sitting in one of her chairs, drinking a cup of tea and looking like she was the least likely person on earth to have just disposed of a body. Red’s associates never failed to throw preconceived notions right out the window.  
  
“Agent Keen. Mr. Reddington. Everything is taken care of.”  
  
“Without a trace, as usual, of course.”  
  
“You know my standards. Speaking of which, you’re looking a little worse for the wear.”  
  
Liz gave Red a surreptitious once-over and willed herself not to blush. She hadn’t noticed just how badly wrinkled his shirt was where she clutched at it, or how much of her lipstick had ended up on his collar, or that he’d actually managed to forget to put his belt back on. She knew she wasn’t much better off.

  
It was no mystery what they’d been doing. Her skin felt raw along her jaw from the beard burn from his stubble, and she was sure it was visible to anyone who knew what they were looking for. Not to mention how… vocal… the two of them had been. Mr. Kaplan had probably heard everything. Red swore she was discreet, but that didn’t make it any less embarrassing as a first impression.  
  
Mr. Kaplan pursed her lips and leaned back in her chair, with an air of disappointment surrounding her. Liz had never really had a mother, but she did have a father and the way the other woman regarded her and Red over the top of her glasses made Liz feel like she was about to be grounded.  
  
“We have to talk,” Mr. Kaplan said.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “How much confidence does the FBI have in your loyalty to the agency, Agent Keen?”
> 
> “You mean after Number Four waltzed in the front door calling my name or before?” Liz said, hooking her thumb in Red’s direction.
> 
> “Point taken.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is it. To those of you who consider my cliffhangers evil, I apologize in advance. Gotta set up the sequel somehow. >:)

“Please sit down,” said Mr. Kaplan, gesturing to the couch across from her. Liz could feel her eyes following her as she and Red sat. The other woman sipped at her tea, scrutinizing them over the rim of the cup. The skin on the back of Liz’s neck itched at the silent attention. She wondered if Red felt it, too.  
  
Finally, Mr. Kaplan leaned forward to set her teacup on the coffee table; Liz could just barely make out a few words in what looked like a woman’s delicate handwriting circling her left wrist.  
  
“How much confidence does the FBI have in your loyalty to the agency, Agent Keen?”  
  
“You mean after Number Four waltzed in the front door calling my name or before?” Liz said, hooking her thumb in Red’s direction.  
  
“Point taken.” She brushed some imagined lint from her skirt and settled back in her chair. “Mr. Reddington informed me that the gun in your husband’s box is linked to an unsolved homicide investigation. An assassination.”  
  
“It is.”  
  
“And you determined this by having a bullet fired from that gun analyzed by the FBI?”  
  
Liz’s stomach started to sink. “I tried to. Everything came back classified. Red…” She hesitated, uncomfortable addressing him so informally in front of a long term associate who didn’t. “Mr. Reddington was able to access the details for me.”  
  
“Do you think nobody higher up the food chain than you has been made aware of the results of the ballistics test, even if you weren’t?”  
  
“They haven’t mentioned it,” she said weakly, realizing even as the words left her mouth just how poor a reassurance that was.  
  
Mr. Kaplan pursed her lips again. “This is textbook, Agent Keen. Your husband is about to disappear off the face of the planet without a trace. Who do you think they’re going to look at first? For goodness’ sake, they would have looked at you even if you hadn’t given them a motive on a silver platter.”  
  
Liz swallowed hard. A quick glance at Red found his face an impassive mask, but there was a tightness to his jaw that gave away his unease. They’d been reckless, it was true, but what’s done was done. They made their bed and now they had to lie in it. It had been worth it as far as Liz was concerned. For the finality of it most of all. That didn’t stop her from feeling sick to her stomach.  
  
“Obviously, there’s no going back from this,” said Mr. Kaplan. “And I’m not doubting that it was necessary—you know the players better than I do and if there was no other way to ensure your husband’s silence, so be it. But none of this changes the fact that when you ran the bullet through their system, you raised all the red flags in the world. I’m good at my job, but nothing I can do will stop them from suspecting you when they realize he’s gone missing.  
  
“I’m not going to insult either of you by assuming you don’t understand how serious this is. Vigilantism is certainly not something the FBI encourages their agents to partake in, but they manage to look the other way where Mr. Reddington is concerned often enough. You might be able to ride his coattails in that regard, especially if they think he did it himself, but you’ll be walking a fine line, that’s for sure. Taking a lot of chances.  
  
“At the very least, they’ll wonder why the hell you were OK with him executing your husband. Why you didn’t turn your husband in instead. Why you didn’t come to them with your suspicions through official channels in the first place.  
  
“You could possibly avoid some of those suspicions by coming clean, telling them the truth or at least some version of it. For instance, you could turn in the box and the gun and tell them he disappeared, but be prepared to be interrogated thoroughly, or throw yourself on their mercy, claiming self-defense. Suffice to say, this probably won’t end well, or easily. If they don’t believe you, you’re screwed.”  
  
Liz took a deep, steadying breath. She was stuck firmly between a rock and a hard place. She killed her husband not for a high and lofty reason like taking out a wanted assassin, but solely because of what he’d done to her personally, what he could do. Victor Fokin hadn’t even been an afterthought when she pulled that trigger. She doubted she was a good enough liar to convince anybody she’d done it for less than self-serving reasons.  
  
And having Red take the blame? As tempting as it might be to let him cover for her—and she didn’t doubt for a second that he would—Mr. Kaplan was right. The FBI would still find it suspicious, maybe even more so than discovering she did the deed herself. They doubted her loyalty enough as it was; it would only give them more ammunition to support the theory that she had been in cahoots with Red from the day he turned himself in.  
  
The mere thought of going through another polygraph test chilled her to the bone, especially considering the fact that she very much had something to hide this time. A lot of things. What if Ressler got creative with the questions she was asked? He latched on to her defensiveness about her soulmate once already. There was nothing to stop him from throwing Red’s name out there as a possibility, even if it was just to rattle her, and then where would they be?  
  
“But there’s another option, isn’t there? The two of you are just too afraid to bring it up. Something a lot less, well… Everything we do is risky, but it’s a hell of a lot less like walking a tightrope every single time I go to work, just waiting for the day someone catches me in a lie.” She turned to look at Red, who was watching her with undisguised surprise, obviously following her train of thought perfectly well. “We can keep doing this the way we’ve been doing this, keep working with them, and deal with the risk of being discovered eventually or…”  
  
She let the sentence hang. After a moment, Red said what she wouldn’t.  
  
“Or we can disappear. Work from the shadows instead.”  
  
A long, silent moment settled over the three of them, the weight of Red’s statement heavy in the air.  
  
Now that the words had been spoken aloud, it felt like a seal had been broken and the temptation to take advantage of the opportunity to escape became almost unbearable. Because, really, she _could_ run. She could leave all this behind. Sure, she would be looking over her shoulder for the rest of her life, but wasn’t she doing that already? Whether or not she liked to admit it, her reputation was tarnished within the FBI, and permanently at that. There would be a dark cloud of suspicion following her for the rest of her career even without Tom’s blood on her hands.  
  
“Running would make me look guilty, wouldn’t it?” Liz asked.  
  
“That’s the problem, sweetie,” said Mr. Kaplan, bluntly. “You are.”    
  
 _Ouch_ , Liz thought. As if she needed more evidence that Mr. Kaplan wasn’t the type to sugar-coat things after how this conversation had gone so far. Although, she supposed she deserved it.  
  
“OK. All right. Say we did this,” she said slowly. “How would we go about it?”  
  
Red didn’t answer her for a long while, taking the time to collect his thoughts. He seemed to be choosing his words very carefully.  
  
“The best thing we can hope for is a clean break. The fewer loose ends, the better. There are a couple ways to achieve that.”  
  
“What’s the easiest?”  
  
Red huffed a laugh, shaking his head in amusement. “The easiest, well…” He trailed off, smile fading as quickly as it formed. “Faking deaths is one of my biggest money-makers.”  
  
Seconds ticked by as the gravity of what he said started to sink in. She felt Red’s sympathy and concern wash over her like a balm—it was clear on his face, even clearer echoing through her.  
  
“It’s not a decision to make lightly. You don’t have to commit to it yet. If you disappear, we can make it look like one of my enemies kidnapped you. It’ll buy you some time and help explain why I would lose contact with the FBI as well.”  
  
She nodded, turning the idea over in her head, considering the risks, the downsides.  
  
“What about my dad?”  
  
“You wouldn’t have to lose contact with Sam. There are options,” he said, “but this is your life, Lizzy. Whatever decision you make, I’ll do everything in my power to keep you safe. If you want to stay then we’ll stay. If you want to run—”  
  
“I think I want to run.”  
  
“You think you want to?”  
  
“I do. I want to run. There’s nothing for me here. Just mistrust and fear of discovery. They already judge me because of what they assume links you to me. Finding out about Tom would only make it worse, whether they believe I was justified in what I did or not. I can’t add another secret I have to keep on top of everything. I can’t keep piling lies on top of lies, secrets on top of secrets. Pretty soon I won’t be able to keep it all straight.”  
  
“While we’re on the subject of secrets,” said Mr. Kaplan, “none of this is taking into account your other… complication.” She looked pointedly at their hands, which even now were near enough to brush each other on the sofa. Both Red and Liz pulled away as if they’d been burnt. “Don’t bother. I know that kind of connection when I see it. Congratulations, it’s about time. I would send you a card but you don’t have an address and the soulmate ones are always so tacky.”  
  
Liz locked eyes with Red and the corner of his lips twitched up in an uncomfortable hint of a smile. She snorted and his smile widened. The two of them being soulmates was turning out to be the worst kept secret this side of Ressler’s resentment of Liz.  
  
“Yes, yes, it’s hilarious. For years, I managed to avoid any up close and personal knowledge of your amorous habits outside of your colorful anecdotes and in one evening I’ve become a hell of a lot more familiar with them than I’ve _ever_ had any desire to be.” She pinned them with her gaze again, curiosity warring with reproach in her eyes. “I know sometimes the pull can be overwhelming. I’m assuming that’s the case with the two of you?” Red raised an eyebrow at her. “Right, I know, stupid question. I hope at the very least you were responsible.”  
  
“That’s, um… That’s not something we have to worry about.” Liz swallowed around the lump in her throat. “It’s why Tom and I were trying to adopt. I never told him the real reason, but I, uh… I think he figured it out. I think it’s why he never forced the issue. Would have been a waste of time.”  
  
There was a softening behind Mr. Kaplan’s eyes and her brows furrowed slightly. “I’m sorry,” she said gruffly.  
  
Liz shook her head, brushing off her concern. “Nothing to be sorry about. It just wasn’t in the cards. Besides,” she said, forcing a smile, “it’s probably for the best anyway, considering, well… everything.”  
  
Liz felt a muted, longing pang in her belly and turned just in time to see Red reach out and take her hand. He ran his thumb along the back of it; she gave him a squeeze in return. So he felt it, too, then. He felt her longing and reflected it back. Would he want a child with her if they could? Maybe he would. What a crazy thing that was.  
  
Her smile faded as a fleeting impression of a moptop little boy floated across the surface of her consciousness, a ghost of what could have been if she’d been able. What a mess it would have been if she and Tom already had a family when all this went down. Just as quickly, the image shifted and the boy was no longer tall and gangling for his age, but smaller, sturdier, blond with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.  
  
She formed an idealized image of what it meant to have a child at a young age, babysitting for her neighbors down the street. Having a child meant stability, family, unconditional love. It meant belonging to someone and having someone belong to you. It meant Christmas and birthdays and sore throats and skinned knees. It meant she could give someone everything Sam gave her.  
  
If things were different, maybe she could let herself feel disappointed that she’d never have a chance to have a child of her own, a biological child. Or _any_ child, if her life kept going the way it was going. Maybe she could even let herself feel disappointed that she’d never have that with Red, as absurd as it sounded for her to even consider wanting it with him to begin with. She didn’t know him well enough to really mourn the loss of what might have been. She’d lose her mind that way.  
  
Mr. Kaplan cleared her throat, bringing their attention back to her. “We should get moving as soon as possible. You’ll have to remove your tracking chip, of course. Start building a false itinerary for the FBI to follow.”  
  
“I haven’t completely taken leave of my senses, Kate,” Red snapped; Liz felt his remorse spike through her as the other woman winced. “I’m sorry,” he said. He hauled himself to his feet and held out a hand to pull Liz up next to him. The adrenaline rush of the past few days was wearing off, the exhaustion finally catching up with them.  
  
“She’s right, Lizzy. I’m afraid you can’t take much with you. We’ll have to travel light, at least in the beginning.”  
  
“That’s fine, it’s not…” She looked around her living room, remembered the shopping trips she and Tom took to choose the furniture, the knickknacks. She wouldn’t be sad to see it go. “Most of this reminds me of him anyway.”  
  
He walked with her towards the stairs, a hand at the small of her back.  
  
“If there’s anything you need after we settle in, just say the name and it’s yours.”  
  
“You don’t have to—“  
  
“Yes,” he said, “I do. I’m responsible for most, if not _all_ , of the chaos in your life. It’s the least I can do. Truly.”  
  
“Agent Keen?” Mr. Kaplan called up the staircase after them; Liz turned to look down at her. “Take the bedsheets.”  
  
Liz flushed at the implication.  
  


* * *

  
  
Red worked on stripping the bed while Liz moved around her bedroom and gathered up her necessities. He finished shoving the sheets into a trash bag and brushed off his hands.  
  
“Where do you keep the fresh linens?”  
  
“Hall closet,” she said. “It’s probably safer if I make it. The less evidence of you here, the better.”  
  
He nodded and turned on his heels, soon returning with a stack of folded sheets and pillowcases. She went about making the bed on autopilot, stopping only when her foot came down on something small and metal. Peering under the edge of the bed, she found Red’s discarded belt where she dropped it earlier.  
  
She stooped to pick it up.  
  
“Here,” she said, and held it out. His fingers brushed hers when he took it, a small smirk on his face as he looped it around his waist. When he finished with the buckle, he looked up and caught her gaze.  
  
“We really don’t have time,” he said, regretfully.  
  
“I know.”  
  
Red took a quick step forward, threaded his fingers through the hair at the nape of her neck, and tilted his head to bring his lips to hers for a thorough kiss.  
  
“Hold that thought. Once we get settled…” He studied her face, her eyes, her mouth. “There are so many things I can’t wait to show you.”  
  
She darted forward to kiss him again and then, with agonizingly slowness, she let his bottom lip slide from between her teeth. “Likewise,” she said. She felt him shiver against her.  
  
The future was a terrifying prospect, but Liz found she wasn’t nearly as afraid as she should have been. She had, quite literally, a partner in crime. At least she wouldn’t have to face it alone.  
  


* * *

  
  
The man sitting in front of an array of monitors looked up at the sound of the front door opening.  
  
“Hey, man.” The second man nodded in acknowledgement, dug around in the greasy paper bag he was carrying, and tossed a foil-wrapped sandwich into the first man’s hands. “Thanks, I’m starved.”    
  
“Boy, did you miss one helluva show today,” he said, around a mouthful of meat and bread and cheese.  
  
The second man pressed his lips together, suppressing the urge to roll his eyes. “What happened?”  
  
“Well, for one, the husband’s dead.”  
  
“Really?”  
  
He nodded enthusiastically. “She fucking shot him, point blank in the head. And then she took Reddington upstairs and fucked him. Twice,” he said, with a leering grin that turned the second man’s stomach. He took in the crumpled tissues in the trash bin, the musky, musty scent in the air and his lip curled in distaste. “Oh, and get this: they’re _soulmates_.”  
  
“Reddington and Keen?”  
  
“Yep,” he said, pleased with himself. “Here, take a load off and I’ll show you.” He took another swig from his hip flask, nearly gleeful as he went to work cueing up the footage to watch for the third time.  
  
A single gunshot rang out, echoing through the unfurnished townhouse; the man at the monitors slumped forward onto the keyboard, his blood seeping between the keys.


End file.
